1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention relate generally to multi-touch surfaces and, more specifically, to multi-touch marking menus and directional chording gestures.
2. Description of the Related Art
User interfaces (UIs) for software programs are designed to include interface elements that are selectable using an input device, such as a mouse, a keyboard, or stylus. The input device is often used to select a specific interface element. Multi-touch surfaces, such as touch pads or touch screens, allow for one or more fingers to be used to navigate the UI. Using one or more fingers on a multi-touch surface, however, simply does not provide the precision of input that is required to navigate UIs effectively.
Several modifications in UI design have been attempted to increase the accuracy of input by one or more fingers to a multi-touch screen, including the ability to zoom-in and zoom-out on elements included the UI or structuring the UI to include a list of large selectable elements. The zoom-in and zoom-out features allow users to interact more efficiently with small interface elements included in the UI since the UI elements can be enlarged to a width and height that is easily selectable by placing a fingertip into contact with the multi-touch screen. Similarly, UIs that include lists of large selectable elements are easily navigated by users since each large selectable element often exceeds the size of a fingertip used to provide input to the multi-touch screen. However, these UI techniques consume precious screen real estate and/or require that the user continually adjusts the zoom level of the interface for accurate input, causing inefficient and cumbersome interaction.
As the foregoing illustrates, there remains a need in the art for a user interface technique that overcomes the drawbacks associated with conventional approaches.